Technical Field of the Disclosure
The instant disclosure generally relates to an irradiation apparatus. More specifically, the instant disclosure relates to an apparatus with a limited swivel rotator for irradiation of material utilizing radiation, like X-rays.
Description of the Related Art
The present disclosure generally relates to a more efficient apparatus and method for irradiation of material utilizing X-rays. While the disclosure will be described for use for medical irradiation, the disclosure is also applicable to various fields in which efficient irradiation of material is in demand including industrial irradiation and/or irradiation of food products. For example, the FDA has approved the use of ionization radiation from three different sources of irradiation that produce essentially equivalent pathogen reduction. The three approved sources are gamma rays from radioactive cobalt-60 or cesium-137, linear accelerators producing electron energies less than ten million volts, and X-Rays generated from equipment energies of less than five million volts. Each of said types of sources are in present use throughout the USA for the irradiation of food products.
The present application is related to U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,212,255 and 6,614,876, which patents are incorporated herein by reference. The present application is also related to U.S. Pat. No. 6,389,099 titled “Irradiation System and Method Using X-Ray and Gamma-Ray Reflector” and to U.S. Pat. No. 7,346,147 titled “X-ray Tube With Cylindrical Anode”, which are also incorporated herein by reference. The present disclosure utilizes a radiation source, like X-Rays, of irradiation that is believed to have a number of advantages over the other two types of sources that need not be discussed in detail herein. Such other sources are generally much larger in size and scale, are much higher in initial cost, and pose higher safety hazards normally requiring more sophisticated irradiation protection.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,515,686 discloses one specific system wherein the X-ray tube with a cylindrical anode has an extremely beneficial use. U.S. Pat. No. 7,515,686 is also incorporated herein by reference. More specifically, U.S. Pat. No. 7,515,686 discloses an apparatus for providing X-ray energy to irradiate a product, where the apparatus includes an elongated X-ray tube that provides the X-ray energy (see U.S. Pat. No. 7,346,147), a wheel structure that rotates about the X-ray tube, and a plurality of containers for the product to be irradiated mounted on the wheel structure. Each container is mounted to the wheel structure by a cradle with swingable mounting elements, i.e. the mounting elements have free rotation. The mounting elements are offset from the center of the cradles thereby allowing the cradles to utilize gravity to maintain an initial horizontal orientation as the cradles are moved in a circle around the X-ray tube by the wheel structure, similar to that of a well-known Ferris wheel. See Claim 1 and Column 2, Line 60 through Column 3, Line 3.
One problem that has been discovered with this free rotation mounting elements of the containers, that utilize gravity like a Ferris wheel for maintaining the initial horizontal orientation, is that they allow for swinging or swiveling of the containers. This swinging or swiveling of the containers permits the distance from the container to the X-ray tube to vary from the initial orientation. In addition, it has been observed that this swinging or swiveling of the containers may even allow the containers with the product to be irradiated to touch the X-ray tube when the containers swing or swivel in the direction toward the X-ray tube. As such, it has been determined that this variable distance between the container with the product being irradiated and the X-ray tube, and/or the touching of the container with the product being irradiated to the X-ray tube is not desired.
The instant disclosure of an irradiation apparatus with a limited swivel rotator is designed to address at least some aspects of the problems discussed above.